NEWSLETTER N°2
March - April - May 2009

Constantly keeping up its effort in Research and Development, STIL’s team is currently working on tomorrow’s solutions, for their customers who desire to equip themselves with always more innovative products.

So, we are pleased to send you our second newsletter, which will inform you about all STIL SA latest news.

Contents :

• STIL S.A. participates in the CONTROL 2009 international trade fair
• STIL S.A. places its sensor in Pole Position
• PHOTON LINES, new distributor for STIL’s products in France and Great Britain
• STIL sensors, innovative tools for the Glass Industry
• CCS Sensors gain in dynamics, thanks to the « Double Frequency » function
• STIL technology at the service of TORE SUPRA

STIL S.A. exhibits at the CONTROL 2009 international trade fair

Like every year, STIL will be exhibiting at the CONTROL international trade fair, the annual meeting for measurement specialists. For the second time, the exhibition will take place in Stuttgart from May 05 to 08, 2009.

Of course, you will be able to rediscover our whole range of CCS and CHR High Resolution non-contact sensors, whose range has extended these last months, as well as our RUBY non-contact spectrocolorimeter, which is endowed with exclusive performances.

Our MPLS “Multi-Points Line” sensors series will be in the spotlight, crowned with their “Silver Photon”, Innovation award received during the last OPTO Show in Paris, France. You will be amazed by their impressive 3D measuring rate.

Above all, CONTROL will be the oppotunity for STIL to reveal its latest innovations in the field of 2D/3D Automatic Optical Inspection (AOI), as well as an original approach of the interferometric measurement process. In short, many surprises are waiting for you on our booth, number 7327, in Hall 7. However, if you will not be able to visit us at the CONTROL show, we invite you to visit our website: www.stilsa.com. For further information concerning CONTROL exhibition, click on the following link: www.control-messe.com.

Stand Hall 7327 7

STIL SA places its sensors in Pole position!

STIL SA, specialist in contactless dimensional metrology, has been chosen by a very famous Formula One racing team to design an exclusive measurement device.

This portable system allows performing high accuracy measurements in real conditions, directly on the track.

The Formula One is a sport in which the difference between two positions in the ranking is counted in fractions of a second; this entails the racing teams having to equip themselves with the more precise available technologies. These innovative technologies surely make the difference between two competitors.

STIL SA Company provides advanced solutions based on its innovating technology: Chromatic Confocal Imaging.

STIL SA high resolution optical sensors range comes up to the most demanding metrological needs: Profilometry, 2D/3D Microtopography, Roughness analysis, Thickness measurement, Autofocus, Vibrations measurement…

STIL SA Chromatic Confocal sensors can be used equally for Research and Development or for Quality control on production line.

PHOTON LINES, new distributor for STIL’s products in France and Great Britain

STIL and PHOTON LINES announce their decision to collaborate through a distributor agreement on French and British markets. Created in 2001, PHOTON LINES is a distribution and services company in optical instrumentation (non contact measurement, imaging…). This partnership concerns both ranges of sensors for dimensional measurement (CCS and CHR) and colour (RUBY).

STIL optical sensors can be implemented in all industrial sectors. They allow measuring all types of materials as well for manufacturing control as for Research and Development. With measurement ranges stretching from 20 microns to 25 millimeters, STIL sensors are best fitted for applications fields such as profilometry, roughness measurement and thickness measurement.

The non contact spectrocolorimeter STIL is gifted with exclusive technical characteristics which allow an easy integration on a production line. The immediate detection of colour drifts allows an instant reaction on the production process. The partnership between STIL, world leader for Confocal Chromatic sensors, and PHOTON LINE’s commercial network, will give users technological excellence and local support.

STIL sensors, innovative tools for the Glass Industry

Products coming out from Glass factories require a lot of dimensional controls in order to control their quality and to master their production costs. STIL Confocal Chromatic sensors are particularly suitable for the Dimensional Measurement of Glass Objects such as LCD panels, Float Glass, Bottles wallthickness (packaging), Glass Wafers, Windshields, Light bulbs... STIL sensors, which have already been chosen by world leading companies such as SAINT GOBAIN, PHILIPS, NASA or ESSILOR, allow measuring any kind of objects with an outstanding accuracy. STIL SA Confocal Chromatic sensors are probably one of the most efficient solutions for your measurement needs in:

• Profilometry / 3D Topography

Flat glass plate measurement: thickness topography

• Thickness

Flat glass plate's sides Altitude measurement (in µm)

To give you an overview of our company and our products ranges, we invite you to visit STIL SA’s website at www.stilsa.com.

CCS Sensors gain in dynamics, thanks to the « Double Frequency » function

Leading products of STIL CCS « point » sensors range, the CCS Prima sensor now possesses the “Double Frequency” function.

This innovative function allows having the sensor simultaneously work with two different frequencies, in order to optimize, in each point of the analyzed surface, the quality of the measurement. Of course, the user can transparently activate the function, because, in each point, the sensor only transmits the optimized measurement. As an example, the profile of a polished metal piece has been analyzed. On the surface of this polished metal piece, microgrooves are engraved. Until now, in order to measure such a sample, the user was constrained to choose one of the two following solutions:

CCS Prima Confocal Chromatic sensor

Picture 1 : « Altitude » and « Intensity » measurements of a polished metal piece, measuring rate : 100Hz.

Picture 2 : Altitude » and « Intensity »measurements of a polished metal piece, measuring rate : 1kHz.

Thanks to the activation of the “Double Frequency” function (picture 3), it is now possible to analyze this kind of objects with an ideal accuracy on each point of the surface.

Picture 3 : « Altitude » and « Intensity »measurement of a polished metal piece, « Double Frequency » measuring mode.

The very heterogeneous reflectivity of certain materials is not a constraint any more.

The « Double Frequency » function offers the access to complete and precise information, thus allowing the CCS Prima sensors to gain in dynamics.

STIL’s technology at the service of TORE SUPRA

In the frame of TORE SUPRA program, the CEA (French Nuclear Agency) of Cadarache, in France, has chosen STIL SA company to develop a 3D measurement system (Chromatic Confocal system), MICROMESURE, in order to characterize the wear of one of the essential tokamak’s components during the annual maintenance operations.

Inside of the core, components are in contact with the plasma and are subject to many thermal constraints. A direct consequence of this internal heat flow is the erosion of the core limiter which consists of carbon bricks. This erosion entails the appearance of an eroded carbon deposit on the limiter’s surface. This surface then becomes heterogeneous and it is necessary to analyze it in order to determine the life time of the components which face the plasma.

During the year 2007, the first part of STIL SA’s project has consisted in designing and manufacturing a non-contact 3D measurement system in order to perform the surface topography of a 0.6m2 section of the limiter (the total surface of the limiter is 7m2) outside of the core.

The STIL MICROMESURE system has allowed realizing, ex-situ, the 3D mapping of this limiter’s section. Each 0.6m2 section contains 45 areas to analyze. One 200mm x 100mm area represents 3 millions of points to acquire (measurement steps: 60µm x 100µm). Moving from an area to another has required an operator manual intervention. The time to measure the 0.6m2 section, representing 135 millions of points, has been 10 days.

This year, the second part of STIL SA’s project consists in manufacturing a completely motorized and automatic MICROMESURE system offering the possibility to analyze the limiter section inside the core.

The technical specifications of this new measurement system remain the same in terms of resolution and accuracy.

This MICROMESURE system consists of two sets of motorized translation stages, one CHR150 optoelectronic controller and two optical measuring heads allowing to consecutivelly measure the top surface and the leading edge of the limiter.

The optical heads chosen to perform the measurement are CL4-MG35, for the top surface, and CL5-MG20, for the leading edge.

The mechanical structure of the optical measurement system’s stand has been manufactured in collaboration with AVANTIS Company.

This new system is meant to optimize the acquisition time and to perform measurements in real conditions, inside the tokamak.

The use of this system, during the annual maintenance operations of the core, will permit a very precise characterization of the limiter wear in order to better understand the exchange phenomena between the plasma and the walls.

In order to introduce the entire STIL S.A. products range, we invite you to visit our website at the following address : www.stilsa.com.

For any further information, or for sending us samples to test, please contact STIL's Sales department :

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